1. Field of the Invention
This invention pertains to a computerized apparatus, method, and software for use in identifying hazardous materials and handling hazardous materials. The invention is particularly intended for use by responders to incidents relating to hazardous materials.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The primary problem addressed by this invention is field response to hazardous material related incidents by emergency first responders such as law enforcement personnel, fire fighters, hazardous materials forensics, terrorism response teams, and the like. In order to respond it is necessary to identify the hazardous material involved and find information and guidance needed for a safe and effective response.
The tools that are now available derive principally from authoritative documents that are provided by Federal Agencies including EPA, NOAA, DOT, NIH, NIOSH. and others. The responder's “bible” is probably the DOT Emergency Response Guide (ERG2000), which provides 62 individual response guides (orange sheets), each of which deals with a class of hazardous material that might be a single compound or individual material or a class of materials. The response guides provide safety recommendations and response information to protect the responders and the public. After securing the scene the first step in using the ERG is identifying the hazards. The ERG recommends placards, container labels, shipping documents, material safety data sheets, and rail car or trailer identification charts and provides indexes to identify the proper response guide based on these sources. It is necessary to know what a material is either by name or identifying numbers to use the ERG.
The original ERG2000 is available in document form and has been ported over to computer-based access including desktop, Pocket PC, and handheld PC platforms such as software known as Hazmatter by Pocket Mobility Inc., PEAC® by Arista Tek, Inc., and CoBRA™ by Defense Group, Inc. Some versions have added additional hazardous materials not in ERG and additional response information. Particularly, CoBRA has response materials relevant to terrorism related incidents. Like the original ERG, all of these units require a responder to learn the identity of a hazardous material either by name or identifying numbers or placards in order to reference the response information. The identification must come from external sources.
Another important reference is the EPA and NOAA chemical database that are available as the Response Information Data Sheets and is also available in a software version distributed as CAMEO® for desktop Windows and MAC computers having >50 Mb of disk space. This application is developed to supply more detailed data particular to individual hazardous materials (a single compound or product), and contains data about over 6,000 individual materials, representing over 80,000 synonyms and trade names. The CAMEO product is built on a general-purpose database manager (Filemaker™). CAMEO is designed to give first responders and planners information about properties of a spilled material and safe response. The underlying database of CAMEO is the EPA/NOAA chemical database that is the primary source of data on the physical and chemical database. While the CAMEO database manager allows text searching of the database, the database is not in a form to use the database for identifying an unknown material by observable properties. One reason is that the database doesn't use consistent language to convey the same or similar meaning. For instance, one material may be “heavier than air”, while another may be “denser than air”, and still another may be “more dense than air”. Similarly, some materials may be “crystals”, while others are “crystalline solids” or “crystalline powder”. Also entering a color may refer to the color of the substance itself, its flame when burning, or the color of a decomposition product. These data are very useful for confirming a suspected identification. However, it would not be a practical way of quickly identifying an unknown material by observable properties. Notwithstanding the fact that the data is in the database, using CAMEO or another text based search of the database to identify unknown materials would be a research project rather than a tool that would be used at an emergency incident. Also, CAMEO, or other text searching with a general-purpose data base manager is too resource intensive for typical handheld computing machines in the field today, such as 16 MB RAM, using a 16 bit 20 MHz CPU.
Another important capability for first responders to a hazardous materials incident is the ability to predict how hazardous materials will react when mixed together. This is a particularly important capability since materials may combine to present much more of a hazard than the starting materials and in particular may require a response that is not foreseen by the conventional response information sheets. To be of great value this capability should be tightly integrated with the process for identifying hazardous materials at an incident. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has developed a systematic methodology for predicting the reactivity of the over 6,000 materials in the CAMEO database when taken in pairs. NOAA has made the methodology available for hand calculation and as a worksheet for use on personal computers running under Oracle Media Objects Player and is also included in CAMEO. In neither of these embodiments, however, is the reactivity prediction process tightly coupled and integrated with identification of unknown materials by observable properties or signs and symptoms of exposure for the reasons previously mentioned. The use of the NOAA methodology by these existing embodiments begins with inputting the materials to be mixed.
Finally, hazardous materials are often associated with terrorist or other controlled activities such as involving the manufacture of illegal or controlled drugs, explosives, or chemical warfare agents. The precursor materials are to be found on many lists associated with different types of activities. Examples of such lists are those published by: UNINDCP (UN International Drug Policy Control Group), the US Drug Enforcement Agency, FBI Explosive Precursors List, UN Security Council List for Iraq (including Australian Group Protocol and Chemical Warfare Precursors), and the Environmental Protection Agency list of Chemical Weapons Precursors.
Another approach involves various chemical analytical tools that might be useful for chemical analysis, such as ionizing spectrometers, infrared fast Fourier Transforms, mass spectrometry, and the like. These are useful devices but require specialized technicians that are often not available on first response, but are more practical at a later stage of the response.
What is needed is a computer-based apparatus for identification of hazardous materials by responders to a hazardous waste incident based on readily observable properties of the hazardous material.
There is a further need for a computer-based apparatus for providing response information needed by responders to a hazardous materials incident, such information specific to hazardous materials that were identified based on their observable properties.
There is a further need for a computer-based apparatus useful in identifying a hazardous material by signs and symptoms associated with exposure to the hazardous material.
There is a further need for a computer-based apparatus useful for identifying whether hazardous materials identified by readily observable properties or signs and systems of exposure are precursors of illegal or controlled drugs, explosives, or chemical warfare agents.
There is a further need for a computer-based apparatus useful for identifying a hazardous material based on observable properties and signs and symptoms of exposure, and also providing response information needed by responders to a hazardous material related incident in a single tightly integrated apparatus which can be provided as software operable on a variety of general use computer platforms including limited performance palm-top devices such as PDAs and smart cell phones and the like as well as laptop and desktop computers.